Provider edges (PEs) have been playing a major role in carrier networks to aggregate traffic from customer premises equipment to the core network. To enable fast packet forwarding in the core network with a relatively stable traffic workload, PEs handle a series of complicated tasks including Class of Service (CoS), traffic shaping and policing, IP multicast, and access control.
Traditionally, PEs are proprietary vendor-developed routers deployed at the edge of the carrier network. These proprietary physical devices feature high reliability and a large throughput. However, they introduce high capital expenditure (CAPEX) and operational expenditure (OPEX) for carrier network operators. Hardware boxes are becoming increasingly complicated to provide support for new protocols or standards. Upgrading service products may require a replacement of the entire high-end box and may require complicated physical configuration (e.g. unplug/plug cables, network management access setup, or device configurations).
Recent years of advance in software based traffic processing engines provides opportunities to overcome the cost issues compared to traditional hardware solutions. Specifically, software-based PE implementation can be hosted in Virtual Machines (VM) and can elastically scale based on demand. Meanwhile, software-based PEs can be easily upgraded and may be controlled by centralized management systems. However, the processing performance of software-based PE can typically be bottlenecked by CPU power and can perform poorly under certain traffic patterns.
This disclosure is directed to solving one or more of the problems in the existing technology.